I mowed the lawn now what part 2/ draft 1

I mowed the lawn now what part 2/draft 1

Edward w Pritchard

fiction

 

update

 These stories are about the search for significance in life. I am sure you don't ever worry about such things, it's all clear to you. Me I know nothing.

 

Here are three previous posts for you to read while I think of what I will do today. I have designed a vast system and process that I have made myself the key component of. A hundred thousand things must interact for my system to function properly. It's Monday morning and the system is moving along as ordained for today, May 19, 2014. It's not 1066, no battle of Hastings is planned and it's not 476 Rome won't fall today either.

 

Cars race by on the road going to work here at 6:20 am and soon the trash truck will make too much noise and disturb me. The good news is the lawn is mowed again, my son helped me and he bought flowers for his Mother or Grand Mother so I am happy about that. Still I am not sure what today means. I am not confused; I just know nothing. One significant thing impresses me, I am hungry already, no food before ten AM[ sixteen hour fast in progress]; I better check and see what is going on in the Ukraine and Syria to see what kind of day I will have.

 

reposted stories for the reader to get in the " SEARCH FOR SIGNIFICANCE" frame of mind

Monday, September 16, 2013

I mowed the lawn; now what

I mowed the lawn; now what

fiction
edward w pritchard

It's better not to talk about some things. Better why, I don't know, I am sure my shrink would disagree, but of course I don't get my shrink for another twenty years. In the future twenty years hence I'll have a shrink for a year or so, but now when it first happened, when I had the first inkling about how things really were, it's just me out here mowing the lawn and I have just had my revelation.

I mowed the lawn now what? The job is done. The mower made it through the entire process without breaking down. I am not the kind of person to spray off the bottom of the mower with a hose or inspect the level of the oil or sharpen the blade for next time or hang the mower on a hook in the garage or suspended from the rafters in the shed.

I mowed the lawn now what? Into the house? Watch baseball or football. I could talk to her. Maybe help the children with their homework. I never really did that. Better to just give encouragement, a heaping of helping platitudes from Dale Carnegie or one of those positive thinkers that we buy their books and for a few days underline everything in the first few pages.

I could write like; I mowed the lawn now what!!! Of course I remember someone said don't use exclamation points. It's just the lawn is mowed. I went to work this week. Here I am standing in this neat yard, by the car in this smallish city and I have just finished mowing the lawn.
the search for significance

fiction
Edward w Pritchard

I sit in a new car, we call them vehicles in the Automobile business, and I ride on a large transport as it hauls the vehicles from the factory to the dealerships to be sold. Someone will buy the new vehicle and I ride in the vehicle as it travels 300 miles or so to find it's new owner. I sit in the vehicle driver's seat as it bounces along the superhighways; some one else drives the transport that hauls the vehicle I sit in, I just sit and listen to the radio with the engine off.

It's a union job. To promote employment each new vehicle must have a representative sit in the drivers seat during the vehicles maiden voyage, factory to showroom. Long ago as part of a court settlement it was agreed that each vehicle must have a custodian to care for it as it was initially driven across America. The auto dealerships were charging the customers and buyers a destination charge and a lawsuit ended by agreement that a ride boy, that's what they call us, would make $11.25 per hour to ride on the vehicle transports taking new cars to the showrooms of America for sale. Each transport carries six or seven vehicles and each transport employs along with the truck driver six or seven ride boys. It helps the economy to have six or seven more people working. The auto business is vital to the economy in many ways.

I listen to the radio mostly as the transports hauls us out across route 80,  77 south or some other major highway. We are not allowed to start the engines of the vehicles we sit in so it can get cold in Winter. It's best when the vehicle I am assigned to monitor has padded leather seats and good leg room. Sometimes when I am driven along I try to reach back home on my cell phone depending on reception. As soon as one run is over I hop into another transport and board another vehicle and head back the other way. Back to my home town. Two trips a day is usual. If it takes more than eight hours road time I get time and a half.

It's a life. Sometimes I wonder though, If there really is a God who decides everything; is this how I should spend my life? What's the significance of it all anyway?

tudo se foi

fiction
edward w pritchard

Tudo se foi
was all I could say,
speaking Portugese
the language of my youth.
When I had vitality
and riches,
stocks, tapestries and silk sheets at night.
Tudo se foi I told the magistrate
No, I couldn't pay my taxes, medical bills,
mortgage or anything really.
Tudo se foi.
I could see the magistrate wasn't listening
it didn't matter officially that he didn't understand.
I wanted him to know, for the record.
Tudo se foi, every thing is gone;
the money went with youth, my health and my looks.
For a minute the Magistrate looked down at me, from the bench and smiled
and asked me to please spell it, for the court reporter.

Magistrate=my vision of  "God "; as he functions in my System and Process.
end